Conventionally, a solid catalyst component containing magnesium, titanium, an electron donor compound, and halogen as essential components used for the polymerization of olefins has been known. A number of methods for polymerizing or copolymerizing olefins in the presence of an olefin polymerization catalyst consisting of the above solid catalyst component, an organoaluminum compound, and an organosilicon compound have been proposed. For example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Publication No. (hereinafter referred to as JP-A) 98045/1977 discloses a method of polymerizing olefins having 3 or more carbon atoms using a catalyst comprising solid catalyst component containing a magnesium halide, a titanium halide, an electron donor such as a diester compound (e.g., an organic carboxylic acid ester), and an organoaluminum compound.
JP-A 19395/1978 discloses a solid catalyst component for olefin polymerization containing an acyl halide, magnesium dihalide, halogen-containing titanium compound, and an alcoholic and/or phenol compound. The catalyst component was proven to be successful to some extent in producing a polymer with excellent mechanical characteristics and moldability in a high yield.
However, this solid catalyst component does not necessarily exhibit sufficiently high catalyst activity which can satisfy recent various requirements for production of olefin polymers, such as low production cost, improved process performance, and capability of manufacturing polymers with sophisticated functions at a high efficiency. Further improvement of the catalyst to satisfy these requirements has been strongly desired.
Accordingly, an object of the present invention is to solve such problems remaining in the prior art and to provide a solid catalyst component and a catalyst for polymerization of olefins, which can produce olefin polymers in a very high yield, in particular, which can produce propylene polymers in a very high yield while retaining high stereoregularity.